The storm is stalking us like a bored dog goes after an unguarded steak.

After having our visit to Màlaga blocked, this came up about Funchal (FOON-Shal), Portugal the night before we docked:

Aw, shit. This was taken the night before we arrived. Funchal, for the uninitiated, is a city on the island of Madeira (any drinkers among us? – kidding… but yes, this is THAT Madeira).

Hmmm. The Portuguese did not have the same experience with flooding as did the Spaniards, so thankfully, they didn’t, in the end, shut down the city. Also, the rain wasn’t as bad.

It was still pretty soggy, though.

Our activity for Funchal wasn’t as exciting as Màlaga (at least to me) but Beloved chose it and… okay… careening down an extraordinarily steep street in a wicker basket with only two pairs of rubber-soled shoes as brakes seems a bit… I dunno, risky?

She was willing to go navigator in a little tin can in a foreign country as I gleefully took the wheel, who am I to deny her bliss?

These wicker baskets got their start in 1850, when people in Monte, a village above Funchal, wanted to get themselves and goods from up there to down below in a hurry.

Shortly thereafter, some clever clogs figured out pushing tourists could be a profitable venture.

These baskets get up to 38kph (23.5mph) which may not sound like much, but it sounded a hella lot faster than we descended due to the drizzle/pouring rain. Not a bad thing I guess.

So once again, the Caribbean Princess pulled over and parked at a city perched on the precipice of a volcanic island. Hence the wicker basket idea. We did the Cable Car, Traditional Sled Ride & Botanical Gardens tour ($125 each).

After we drove up to the top of the mountains and took the toboggans down the hill, the guide announced we would be going to the kitty-trall.

Kitty-trall? Uhhh…?

Our Lady of Monte Church is quite proud of the fact they have the final resting place of his majesty, Emperor (Kaiser) Charles I of Austria.

If you’re saying “who…?” you are, I assure you, not alone. HRH was also simultaneously Charles IV of Hungary (remember the Austro-Hungarian empire from your history lessons? No? Never mind…)

His reign didn’t last long, sadly, and he got there in a roundabout way. After Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir apparent to the throne, and his wife were offed in 1914 (okay, you remember that, right? Some asshole decided he had to murder a member of the Austrian royal family to unify the southern Slavic people…), Austria-Hungary used the occasion to declare war on Yugoslavia and Europe lit up like a damn Christmas tree. WWI was underway.

The deaths left a bit of a problem for Emperor Franz Joseph, as he had no spare heir and his grandkids were the result of a morganatic marriage on which he had insisted his son engage.

(Don’t feel bad, I had to look it up too.)

A morganatic marriage is when an heir (male, of course) wants to marry (gasp) below his station (read: to a… well… a… commoner) and to be allowed to do so, his wife doesn’t get elevated to his level and his children, while not illegitimate, don’t get to inherit their father’s titles, fiefs (seriously, what the hell?) or entitled properties.

So the kids were essentially treated as bastards by Grandpa Franz Joseph, although they really weren’t. Mom and Dad married for love and they got screwed.

Also sucked for Franz Joseph… having lost his son, he lost his heir (I guess he wasn’t really concerned about who would be next on the throne after sonny-boy took over – maybe he figured he was dead, who cares? No data).

The next entitled individual was his grand-nephew, the aforementioned Charles I. When Franz Joseph bit the big one in 1916, Charlie found himself with a crown on the ole cranium.

His coronation was that same year (29 years old), and he attempted to keep Austria-Hungary out of WWI, of which he failed miserably because the efforts were seen as duplicitous.

Also, he was trying to keep the peace with the two rather different entities in his kingdom and it wasn’t working well. In 1918 he took off for Switzerland, but didn’t actually abdicate. He was deposed the following year.

Poor bugger wound up exiled in Madeira and due to his awful living conditions (not really mentioned in the tour), he died of pneumonia in 1922. He was beatified in 20-something-something after a nun was healed of something. Not yet sainted, however.

His remains wound up in that church, and they’re quite proud of it.

Oooookay, I sure went down the rabbit hole on that one, sorry.

After touring the church, we hiked over to the cable cars. NOT the first cable car station (the one with panoramic views of Funchal) but instead the second one that loops you over a green canyon – it doesn’t actually descend. It was pretty, but I thought we were gonna go over the city.

So we next waddled over to the botanical gardens. Really beautiful.

After a rather long and very narrated walk through the garden (the tour guide was an enthusiastic botanist), we went back to the ship.

It was okay, but if I was a drinker, I’d be kinda cheesed I hadn’t gone on a booze-tasting tour.